—because the blows land on the skin.

Points derived from the two hadiths:

1. The harshness of the Bedouins stems from their distance from learning, rulings, and etiquette: one of them implored the Prophet—who does not speak from whim—to judge only by the Book of Allah.

2. The fine character of the Prophet ﷺ: he did not reprimand the man despite his impolite manner toward him.

3. The ḥadd for the previously-married adulterer is stoning with stones until he dies. A muḥṣan is someone who has had vaginal intercourse within a valid marriage, is free, and is legally accountable.

4. The ḥadd for an adulterer who has never been married is one hundred lashes and a year’s banishment.

5. It is impermissible to accept compensation to annul the ḥudūd; accepting it amounts to consuming wealth unlawfully.

6. Whoever commits a forbidden act out of ignorance or forgetfulness is not disciplined but taught. This man ransomed the ḥadd from his son with one hundred sheep and a slave-girl, thinking it lawful and beneficial; the Prophet ﷺ merely informed him of the ruling and returned the sheep and the slave-girl.

7. The hadith establishes a general legal principle: when someone performs an act believing its cause exists, then discovers the cause is absent, the act is void and any resulting effects are reversed.

8. Al-Ḥāfiẓ Ibn Ḥajar said that permission to dispose of property is limited to sound contracts. Ibn Daqīq al-ʿĪd added: what is taken through a defective transaction must be returned and is not lawfully owned.

9. It is permissible to appoint an agent to establish and execute the ḥudūd.

10. The ḥudūd are the responsibility of the supreme leader (imam) or his deputy; no one else may carry them out.

11. The hadith is cited as proof that a single confession suffices to establish and carry out the ḥadd; the differing views on this will be mentioned, Allah willing.